NPDC-1

The discovery of NPDC-1 (neuronal proliferation, differentiation and control protein 1) was the result of a study of genes that were preferentially expressed in immortalized neural precursor cell lines at the onset of contact inhibition of proliferation and subsequent differentiation. It was further found that transfection of transformed cells with NPDC-1 led to increased doubling times and suppression of many characteristics of transformation. NPDC-1 is differentially expressed in brain and lung and has been shown to interact directly with the transcription factor E2F-1 as well as D-type cyclins and cdk2. NPDC-1 has been identified as a modulator of transcriptiona levents mediated by retinoic acid and the protein level and activity of NPDC-1 have been shown to be regulated by phosphorylation mediated proteasomal degradation.